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Documentary gives look at best of journalism

In this era where the term “fake news” is in vogue, a documentary like “The Panama Papers” provides a refreshing example of journalism at its smartest and most courageous.

Premiering tonight on EPIX, the 100-minute film from director Alex Winter (“Deep Web”) tells the story of an international group of reporters who pooled efforts and resources to expose a massive global corruption scandal wherein the rich, powerful and famous could hide their cash from government authorities through the establishment of shell corporations and thus evade taxes.

And, it turns out, the amount of cash not going into the public kitty – in 200 countries worldwide – is pretty staggering, in the trillions of dollars, in fact; money that could be spent on infrastructure, health care and education, for instance.

And it all started with a whistleblower named John Doe, who leaked data from the Panamanian law firm that set up the shell corporations